Dave's Music #61 Emily Scott Robinson - American Siren

I'm excited to share this study of Emily Scott Robinson's Oct 2021 release of "American Siren" on Oh Boy Records.  A peer of mine in the booking world, Parker Forsell told me a while back I should look up Emily for the folk fest, and very quickly I bought both her releases of Traveling Mercies (2019) and Magnolia Queen (2016)  She has a very easy voice to listen to, and she has an incredible songwriting gift of telling stories in four minute increments, which some could be easily made fleshed out into mini-series.  I truly know I'll see her live someday even if I recently just missed an opportunity to travel 2.5 hours on a Sunday night to see her.  If only I was retired already.

As far as this release goes, I'm a late voice in giving accolades. Just look at how many nominations and best of 2021 lists she made.  I would argue that some of this is because Oh Boy gets more notice, this is a fine release, but every release Emily has is worth this kind of recognition.   Since they might have all written in glowing deserved words, let's look at the writing and listen to each song.

1) Old Gods

Always worry about old farts playing tricks on you, and this song has melody that makes you think she just might be singing an old traditional song.

Let's start off with a video to get going.

Your blue eyes are there when I close mine
I see your sweet face when I dream
My heart is all ragged in pieces
Bleeding at every seam

And are you a trick of the memory
That the old gods are playing on me
Carry my prayers on the ocean

2) Things You Learn the Hard Way 

This is such a perfect premise for a song, I wondered what came first a list of things or the chorus.  The second verse is my favorite.  The melody and arrangement are deceptively jazzy.

Don’t get married in a church
called Mother of our Sorrows
‘Cause if it don’t feel right today
It won’t feel right tomorrow
A baby will not be enough
To get a man to stay
You can’t change or fix someone
You gotta let ‘em walk away
Don’t go to the dry well looking for a drink
Never leave your wedding band too close to the kitchen sink

Things you learn the hard way
Some lessons you can’t teach
Until you’re living through ‘em
The wisdom’s out of reach
Things you learn the hard way
Things you learn the hard way

As I was looking at this post for a Flashback Friday, I found this great video of Emily being interviewed by a radio station.

3) If Trouble Comes A Looking

Oh my... this song was featured in my Trouble list, and it's such a great story of love and infidelity; and give it up for a great chorus too. I'm as loyal and innocent as a hound dog since my wife and I have started dating in 1978, but the lust in this song I can relate to.  I'm happy for the couple in the song. Emily writes it much easier and cleaner than it is in real life, but life does make those romantic drama shows pale in comparison.  I'm hoping that Emily's story was painted accurately for someone.

If trouble comes a’ lookin’ she won’t be hard to find
She’s sitting in the hotel bar on her second glass of wine
She put a pretty dress on, wiped the tears out of her eyes
And if trouble comes a’lookin she won’t be hard to find

This is a great romance novel song, and one that has got me thinking if I can make a playlist with that theme.

4) Let 'Em Burn

Many reviews point to this song as getting a lot of attention including NPR selecting it the 19th best song in 2021!  Again I picked the second verse where Emily brings the story to the flame, it is truly a dramatic piece worthy of the praise it has received.

The coffee’s hot, the kids asleep
This is the only time I feel like I can breathe
But late last night I locked the door
And cried myself to sleep on the bathroom floor
‘Cause I lit a match and held it to my yearning
And found out I was a house already burning

We need to share at least one of her videos, why not the one NPR thinks is the best.

5) Cheap Seats

Every musician who is striving to make it can relate to going to a big concert and being in the cheap seats, wondering and wishing to be the voice on the stage.  Emily wraps the song's narrator in likely service job, with aspirations of writing the next hit.  She probably has a few hours in her life to relate to this song.

I’m so hungry I can taste it
Want so badly just to make it
I’ve got a thousand songs inside me left to write
Gotta find my voice and use it
Set true North and do not lose it
And keep that candle burnin’ through the night
I want everything before I’m ready
And it’ll only come once I am standing steady

Flashback Friday Update video added

6) Hometown Hero

Emily uses her best storytelling techniques to write the lament of a soldier returning from home only to take his life hearing the noise of war in his head.  Ok so she took almost five minutes to get it done, none of the words are wasted, and you need to listen to the ending to hear the taps plucked out on the banjo.

Our hometown hero’s in the news today
The flags are flying at half mast
We buried you on a clear blue All Saints Day
To the lonesome sound of trumpet playing taps

PER the video this soldier was family.

7) Lost Woman's Prayer

I do wonder about this being autobiographical and I don't want to give the story away though I sure hope these two women are still in touch.  If you want to read along, each song page in Bandcamp has the lyrics I've been sharing, so click here. 

Let’s raise up our glass, here’s a toast to the past
And a toast as we turn a new page…
May you be forever changed

Awe... so sweet Emily posted an acoustic version of this:

8) Every Day in Faith

I for one so appreciate an artist for adding lyrics to each song; and not just for this blog.  Truly as an inspiring writer, you can look at lyrics and admire a song and then listen.  It's such a craft, this uses repeated lines in patterns for each verse.  Read them and then listen; you'll get a new appreciation for the song.  In a way it's written kind of like hymns in church so to me it's ironic it's wrapped around a message of faith.

Every day in faith I came
Every day in faith I came
And by some miracle beyond me I have found my way
‘cause every day in faith I came

Some lessons they were hard to learn
Some lessons they were hard to learn
But I thank my darkest teachers for the scars that I have earned
Some lessons they were hard to learn

If I’d seen the hills and valleys on the road
If I’d seen the hills and valleys on the road
I might’ve never had the courage to pack my bags and go
If I’d seen the hills and valleys on the road

I love you and I swear I always will
I love you and I swear I always will
I see you cross a crowded room and my heart it quickens still
I love you and I swear I always will

She did this song acoustic too.

9) Lightning in a Bottle

Definitely another favorite of mine, and this time I'll share the first verse because can't we all taste that refreshing first beer? One of the things of this release is the variety of mixes, and this one is so beautiful being stripped down to a guitar, a gentle violin, and then add in a 2nd voice and not only as harmony but as a 2nd voice.

The summer that I turned nineteen was a hundred shades of green
I just wanted to be seen
Heavy like the air before it rains, clean like grass and summer sage
I lost track of all the days
Warm like the sunshine on the pines, fresh tomatoes off the vine
Pickin’ peaches for the pie
Cold, like that first beer on my lips and those midnight skinny dips
Careful like your kiss

Lightning in a bottle, if only I had known
I’d be back here after twenty years driving down this road
Wondering where that girl has gone and how to bring her back
Missing life when it was easier and love when it was magic

Here's an update added Nov 10, 2022... I had a chance to listen to her live concert for Paste and her description of this song was so cool how it turned into this slower stripped down production.  The whole 25 minute concert is with songs from this release.

10 Old North State

Emily found an old poem to end the release, North Carolina's Official State Toast.  You got me, I had no idea how many states have official toasts so I googled it, NC is it!

YES, I think we can make a playlist now of the whole cd with live recordings.  Here we're back in the radio studio.

So for our FLASHBACK Friday revisit to this post, I did get live videos for every song, so here is a one click playlist for you to listen to... though you know I think you should first by the studio version:

Hope you loved the journey.  You can find and follow us on Facebook  and as always Good Music has NO Expiration Date, so if you are listening to this ten years from now, it still will be awesome music.  If this is a first time visit, check out the index of themes for past Reviews and Playlist editions and for the Reviews alone, click here. 

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